Handling bridgeheads

[AndersEkl]

Bridgeheads are deprecated and we should remove this from the document. It may be mentioned in several places. There is, for instance, a paragraph about it in the "Poetry and Verse" section.

This is mentioned in #27 , but I thought it might be good to make it a separate issue.

[josteinaj]

You mean remove the use of the deprecated vocabulary value, or remove bridgeheads completely? Isn't there a lot of cases where we want structurally unimportant headings? There is a lot of them in newspapers, but probably also in magazines.

[AndersEkl]

I mean remove the use of the bridgehead value. It needs to be handled some other way, of course.

[martinpub]

Having read through the discussions here and in #27, I think there are three alternatives:

1. Keep using @epub:type bridgehead despite its deprecation in EPUB SSV.
2. Using h[x] headings but perhaps with relaxing the rule of having all those in the nav toc (this could be accomplished by assigning them a class, so that they could be excluded from validation cross-reference checks, as suggested by Jonas).
3. Use some other markup that is none of the above. Maybe <p class="bridgehead"> or similar. (I believe adding @role="heading" will effectively be similar to h[x] headings.)

I think I vote for 2. 3 or 1 could be useful if we believe that we, or rather external producers, will not always be able to determine the correct level, but I'm not sure that is the case?

[jonaslil]

If we want to cover all possible cases, then maybe a combination of 2 and 3 would make sense?

If it is possible to determine the heading level, but it does not make sense to have it in the toc, then use alternative 2. Example: Headings of quoted poems in a prose work. The poems are always at the same level in the main heading hierarchy.

For cases where we don't want the heading in the toc and it is not possible to determine the level, then use for example <p class="poem-title">, <p class="box-title">. For styling purposes and for making the class names easy to understand, I think separate classes would be better than class="bridgehead".

[AndersEkl]

I'd rather not continue using something that has been deprecated. I think we should include options 2 and 3. Should headings marked up as <p> always have the role set to heading?

[oscarlcarlsson]

I think that keeping them as <p> with a heading role sounds good. It's probably the easisest rule to follow as well.

[jonaslil]

I'm not sure about the heading role. The use case would be when the level can't be determined. But normally, role="heading" is complemented with a level attribute. If you don't specify the level, it defaults to 2 and this is what screen readers convey.

[AndersEkl]

TODO: Define a class for headings that exclude them from the nav file. Define a class to make <p> into a "fake" heading and describe use cases for text boxes, poetry etc.

[AndersEkl]

In the section about text boxes there is a paragraph about bridgehead being deprecated. Do we need that if we now have a specified other solution? @martinpub @jonaslil @oscarlcarlsson @lindheli

[martinpub]

Either remove it, or refer to the new solution for "fake headings"?

[AndersEkl]

Yeah, I'll remove it and replace it with the solutions we agreed upon yesterday. The class name will be "faux-hd", by the way. :)

[AndersEkl]

I have now added text in the sections about headings, text boxes and poetry. I leave the issue open a few days if anyone has any comments or further suggestions.

[martinpub]

Great work Anders!

[jonaslil]

Agree, great work! A question:

The general rule for poems, stated at the beginning, is to wrap them in <div class="verse">. Later on, it is said section should be used if the poem is given an h# heading. Should this section have class="verse" as well, to distinguish poems from other types of sections? It might be good for styling purposes.

[AndersEkl]

@jonaslil Great idea! I will add this and then close this issue.

[AndersEkl]

Closing this now!